Teaching is fundamentally a social activity that involves effective relationship-building with students.\u00a0 It starts with acknowledging the curricular context of the teaching and the expectations of the students.\u00a0 For example:\u00a0 Is the course core or elective?\u00a0 Where is it placed in the student\u2019s program of study?\u00a0 What is the knowledge of the students when they enter the course?\u00a0 What other courses are the students taking?\u00a0 Why might the students be interested in the course material?\u00a0 How might I, that is, the educator, motivate the students to learn?<\/p>\n
Teaching is more likely to be successful if students have a clear understanding of what they are expected to learn (i.e., clearly stated course learning outcomes), what the course provides that will help them construct their knowledge pertaining to the learning outcomes (i.e., what are the course learning activities), and how each student will know the level at which they have achieved the learning outcomes (i.e., what are the learning assessments).<\/p>\n
The sequence of learning activities in a course should be carefully designed such that students can recall and build upon previously acquired knowledge.\u00a0 Ideally, each concept introduced in a course arises logically from the preceding concept and is, in some way, dependent on the preceding concept.\u00a0 Similarly, each concept learned is foundational to the subsequent concept to be learned in the course.\u00a0 Further, best-practice teaching acknowledges that some concepts are more significant to the learning process than others.\u00a0 That is, once a \u201cthreshold\u201d concept is understood, then a portal has been \u201copened\u201d to many other concepts (See the work of Meyer and Land).\u00a0 An example of a threshold concept is the notion of complex numbers. Once learned, a new intellectual world is open to the student.<\/p>\n